Mother Nature Whispers Spring

She inhaled deeply dragging ragged, piercingly cold knives of air across my face.  
Then, she held her breath, leaving me in cold desolation for what has seemed an eternity.
I have anxiously anticipated her warm exhalation growing more impatient by the minute.
Like a petulant child, I have stomped my feet and shouted, “I want it now”.  
Restlessness and frustration builds and I chomping at the bit for she does not bid my commands.
She is her own woman, as all are, and does things in her own time as she sees fit.  
Finally, I begin to see her lips purse and pink and the first tendrils of warm wet breath leave her lips, whispering warm promises of tomorrows spring.
 

This morning I went out to walk the land and I finally saw what I have been yearning the long months of winter to see; the pink, white, yellow and purple buds that tip the bare branches of tree’s, like paint on the tip of a brush that is getting ready to blossom a canvas with color.

It seems as though the longer winter draws on, the colder my heart grows; till my thoughts, words and actions are sharply edged by jagged, icy razors. Anxiety and restlessness grow and I feel as if I am holding my breath to the point of explosion.  I can barely stand to be in my skin. Warm days come followed by cold, giving the feel of partial exhalation followed by even deeper held breaths that tare at the soul.  It is at this point, when I begin looking for the buds of spring reminding myself it’s just a bit longer.  Today, I found them. I wish I could say that the exhalation was quick and full, relieving all the built up pressure in a geyser of pent of energy and frustration, but it’s not. This exhaled breath will be long and slow, slowly melting the icy edges then working its way center to the core.

While, I try and work with more eloquent words and soft rhythms to explain, in a pretty way, the moments before spring the truth is, in our household, the moments before and at the beginning spring are edgy, ugly and have a staccato rhythm. Everyone is on edge, we argue more and our time trapped in buildings feels like handing TNT, no one is sure when someone will snap. While, this is funny while I write it, it is hell to be in. So, why am I sharing with you that living in my house right now is like working for the bomb squad, well, I am making a guess that mine isn’t the only home like this right now and I want you to know, it is not just you, you are not alone or crazy, and it will be better soon. Until then, I will share a frustrated and condoling tear with you and am sending warm hugs and thoughts of summer time fun. Hang on we will make it through.  J

Peace, Love and Happiness,
Jen

Human Under Construction

WARNING
Proceed with Caution

Happy New Year! 2015 was a doozy, here is hoping I learn as much in 2016 but in a much gentler way

Hi and welcome, to Living in a State of Jen, my name if Jennifer Horton a.k.a. Jen and this is my professionally personal website.

I am a human first, but also, a woman, wife, mother, dancer, photographer, graphic designer, deeply passionate, music and book junky, writer, who grouts her own shower, hot headed, impatient, lazy over achiever, type A personality, Virgo, seeker of faith, human being of many, sometimes contradictory, beliefs, interests and so much more.

If you have been to this website before January of 2016, this was my professional website for photography and graphic design; I will still continue both photography and graphic design, but in addition, it is my intention to also incorporate through blog, photography, graphic design and other means, some of my other professional and personal passions.

If you checked into the website in 2015, you definitely noticed there was a distinct lack of new work or anything going on on here, my apologies. 2015 was an extremely difficult year for my family and myself, I will not bore you with all the details here in the “about” section, I am sure some will get leaked out in the blog.
Short version of long story, my life, so by default my work has changed profoundly.  A couple such changes and most important to this site are; currently my livelihood does not depend on the popularity of this site which, is incredibly liberating, also last year I lived in southern Illinois and I now, currently, live in Northeastern Mississippi, if you want to know why, look around and stay tuned.
 

So what the heck will you likely see here on the website?
Let me use the term, likely to include but not limited to;
images, information, links, images and more about;
Photography
Graphic Design
Dance
Parenting
remodeling
child advocacy
being a woman
sexual abuse
music
Mississippi
St. Louis region
Beach
and so much more………………

I can promise you one thing, I never know what life is going to throw at me and my life is a W.I.P. (Work In Progress), so hang on, and prepare for anything and everything.

Wishing you Peace, Love and Happiness,
Jen

P.S. Please, feel free to message me about spelling and grammatical errors, I love not having to pay an editor. 

Discovering Alan Lomax via the song “Flower” by Moby

Who would have thought, someone posting a video of Moby’s, “Flower” in reference to a workout would have sent me on hours’ worth of research, visiting the online Library Of Congress and being introduced to the history of Alan Lomax, a man who I think is going to become a bit of an inspiration to me? Wow, I love a knowledge adventure that takes me down the rabbit hole of the internet and my self-discovery.  Here’s how it happened…

First, I love music, so, many times when someone shares a video link to a song, I have to check it out.
In the case of “Flower” by Moby, I recognized the tune immediately but not from this version.

For me, there are haunting melodies in my memory
(old folk songs, I can thank my family for the music passed down and many nights of watching PBS documentaries),
that when triggered by other current music
(often because the current song was sampled from old folk music),
I find myself desperately wanting to hear the original version that resonates in my memory.

Unfortunately, I usually don’t know who the original version was done by or even what is different about the lyrics or melody, which makes it a long process of searching for what I thought I was looking for. Why I use the term, what I thought I was looking for, is in this case with Looking for the origin song of “Flower” I was looking for,” Bring Sally Up,” which as it turns out, aren’t even the right lyrics. Although in my defense, by the confusing searches suggestions, I was not the only one to do this. For those of you reading this that are saying in your head or out loud, well duh of course it is, “Green Sally, Up,” thumbs up and gold sticky star for you, Sorry, I had to learn that the long way around, like I do most things in life.

Now, that I am on track with actually knowing the lyrics to the song that I am looking for, which makes it a lot easier, here comes what I thought was going to be the easy part, look up the song to find the one that sounded right to me. I was so wrong!  As it turns out, it was not easy because Moby’s version has drowned out older versions, in the ocean of internet info.  After, quiet some time, of listening to several versions, one of which, I would ground my children for playing, L  I finally stumbled across the one I was looking for (the sound I remembered) and what also seems to be the oldest recording publicly available. Cool, I should be happy and done now and moving along with my day, right?

Umm, wrong….

Now, my curiosity has gotten the better of me, when in this recording several names pop up, Mattie Garder, Mary Gardner, Jesse Lee Pratcher. Now, I really want to see if there are any other recordings by them. They really spark my interest for several reasons; first, the love of new music second, they are African American woman singing cultural music with a deep and tumultuous history and lastly, because I have recently moved to Mississippi which is the birthplace of American music, no not because of Elvis… ;) Ya Gotta sing the blues, baby.

Unfortunately, in the land of internet info, these human beings either do not exist or are buried within millions of pages, UHG… But, thatjust makes me even more determined, to right what I feel is the injustice of these woman not being given enough credit for their contribution. So, now, it is ON internet! I will find at least some information about these people, you will not thwart me! Yes, I know the internet is not against me it is just stored information but if you have ever tried and failed or had intense difficulty trying to find information on the internet, I am sure that you to have felt like it was out to get you; If not try it sometime, delusions of persecution can really help with productivity at times. J

Anyway, back to the main focus, if there is one, which has changed since the beginning of this journey. Well, I just had to go about finding these woman’s history another way.  The other name attached to, “Green Sally, Up” is Alan Lomax, who turns out, was this really interesting man who traveled the world, especially the southern states of the US in the late 1950’s recording the folk music, photographing and documenting culture that was not yet widely known, as it would be in the next decade of civil rights movements.  Incidentally, this is how I ended up on the Library of congress web site because there is this very interesting book and lecture by Tom Piazza about Alan Lomax which is featured there, though I found it through the World News website. So, now I have gotten this really neat introduction to Alan Lomax who was a significant part of documenting American music and an interesting character to boot but I still don’t know much about Mattie Garder, Mary Gardner, Jesse Lee Pratcher I am hoping as I dig more through Alan Lomax’s work I will find more information, I am really hoping to find photographs of them.

To sum up why I find this so interesting, is one song, one random post on a social website, led me to a man with so many of my common interests such as; music, American music, Mississippi, photography, writing, documentary, history, dance, and so many more things that I look forward to learning.

Isn’t life’s twist and turns, amazing!  

I will leave you with a list of links, if you would like to share in what I have discovered today. Obviously, there is a bunch more information out there. Have some fun, jam to a fun groove and soak up some knowledge.

Where it started

Moby - Flower (Official Audio)

https://youtu.be/6A2V9Bu80J4

The original one I remembered

Mattie Garder, Mary Gardner, Jesse Lee Pratcher - Green Sally, Up
A black children's singing game performed by a group of women in Como, Miss. Moby sampled this song for his song Flower.

https://youtu.be/fPBJRwp7eEQ

The link to WN.com video of Tom Piazza talking about his book about Alan Lomax or where I got really interested in Alan Lomax.
 Make it through the dull intro Tom Piazza is a captivating speaker.
The Southern Journey of Alan Lomax: Words, Photographs, and Music
Tom Piazza discussed his new book, "The Southern Journey of Alan Lomax: Words, Photographs, and Music." For captions, transcript, and more information visit ...
http://wn.com/the_southern_journey_of_alan_lomax_words,_photographs,_and_music

Some extra links

Info about the Album, “Green Sally, Up” was on
I‘ll Be So Glad When the Sun Goes Down Alan Lomax’s “Southern Journey” 1959 – 1960
http://www.culturalequity.org/ce_images/features/globaljukebox/IllBeGladOneSheet.pdf

Found more information while searching Jesse Lee Pratche Como, Ms. 

http://www.discogs.com/Various-Southern-Journey-Volume-3-61-Highway-Mississippi-Delta-Country-Blues-Spirituals-Work-Songs-D/release/1377877

Peace, Love and Happiness,
Jen

PS Please feel free to correct my spelling and grammar mistakes, I love not having to pay an editor.  J